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Prodigal Prince”, Critics Have Read the Henry IV Plays As Adaptations of the Parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15.11

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Prodigal Prince”, Critics Have Read the Henry IV Plays As Adaptations of the Parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15.11 Abstract Since John Dover Wilson’s declaration that Prince Hal is a “prodigal prince”, critics have read the Henry IV plays as adaptations of the parable of the prodigal son (Luke 15.11- 32). Although the parable informs the plays, Hal is not “prodigal” in the predominant early modern understanding of prodigality. Prodigality is defined by wasteful excess, often financial in nature, and prodigal sons were defined as much by this excess as by association with the Lukan paradigm. The Henry IVs present one of the most complex and enduring formulations of the relationship between prodigality and the parable in early modern literature, which cannot be understood without an appropriate understanding of prodigality in context. This article explicates early modern prodigality, accounting for its classical context, secular and religious usage, gendered dimension, and role in dramatic adaptations of the parable. It then situates the Henry IVs within this context and delineates how Hal enacts a prodigal son plot with Falstaff’s prodigality functioning in place of his own prodigal dissolution. By providing a historicist understanding of prodigal sons, this article facilitates more accurate readings of prodigality and the parable in early modern culture. The unprodigal prince?: Defining prodigality in the Henry IVs 1943 saw the publication of John Dover Wilson’s The Fortunes of Falstaff, a landmark in Shakespeare scholarship that has long remained a staple of Henriad criticism. In this book, Wilson advances one of the earliest and most influential analyses of the Henry IVs as adaptations of the parable of the prodigal son, Luke 15.11-32. Here, Wilson casts Hal as a refashioning of “the traditional royal prodigal” in plays that dramatise “the growing-up of a madcap prince” (22), drawing his reading from the congruent narrative structures of the plays and the parable. This identification of Hal as “the prodigal prince” (17) has endured and he has become the most well-known gadabout youth of early modern prodigal son drama. However, despite the popularity of this reading, claims of “notoriously prodigal” Hal’s prodigality (Kastan 13) are not wholly accurate to the early modern understanding of the concept. Wilson’s use of “prodigal” (and that of subsequent commenters) functions in the modern sense of a signifier of the Lukan arc, denoting a “wildness in youth” followed by the “sudden change” of reformation (20). Prominent scholars of early modern prodigal sons such as Richard Helgerson, Ervin Beck, Alan Young, and Alexander Leggatt have defined prodigal sons and their prodigality by this arc, but prodigality in the early modern sense more readily designates wasteful expenditure and excess than filial rebellion and reform. The essentially excessive element of early modern prodigality has been overlooked, an omission that this article aims to rectify with a historicist reading of prodigality and the parable in the Henry IVs. It focuses especially on the role of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics in constructing early modern notions of financial excess. Though the influence of this text on the early modern period is often noted, its economic theories are rarely considered. By situating the Henry IVs in relation to the classical context informing early modern prodigality, this article investigates Hal’s engagement with prodigality and the extent to which he does and does not exhibit various prodigal behaviours, as well as explicating how the plays adapt the prodigal son narrative for a son whose prodigality proves atypical among early modern prodigal son figures. It discusses Falstaff’s role as scapegoat within Hal’s enactment of the parable’s narrative, and demonstrates how Falstaff’s prodigality enables Hal’s fulfilment of a redemptive arc without Hal prodigally trespassing. It also addresses Hal’s engagement with more unusual forms of prodigality and assesses the extent to which Hal can and should be considered a prodigal son. By historicising prodigality, we gain a more accurate and nuanced perspective on not just the Henry IVs, but on financial ethics more generally in early modern England. Prodigality defines the morality of excessive expenditure. In early modern England, to spend on luxuries, immoral pursuits, or simply to fail to moderately govern one’s finances was not just indicative of poor economic knowledge but was itself a moral failing. Some work has been done in recent years on the gendered context of financial excess, such as that by Maria Prendergast, Jennifer Panek, Alexandra Shepard, Michelle Dowd, and Ina Habermann. Joshua Scodel has worked extensively on early modern excess, but he only engages with prodigality cursorily (133, 200). Beyond this, research on prodigality has primarily conceptualised it as a pattern of stray and return derived from the parable of the prodigal son. The most influential text in this regard is Richard Helgerson’s The Elizabethan Prodigals, a study of writers who identified with the Lukan prodigal. Helgerson focuses on a type of figurative prodigality in which Elizabethan writers figure romantic writing as a form of prodigal rebellion of which they must ultimately repent in favour of civic humanism. Although there are many strengths to this reading, some of which I will later address, Helgerson’s comparison is, like Wilson’s, derived from the structural congruence between the parable and patterns of stray and return. Thus, while his use of “prodigal son” as signifying the parable is perfectly accurate, his refiguring of prodigality as a “pattern” of rebellion (3) and defiance of an older generation (35) is not wholly accurate to its dominant early modern meaning as denoting excess. And the structure of this excess is vital to understanding Hal, Falstaff, and the parabolic structure in the Henry IVs. Prodigality governs many fields: it emerges in relation to forms of (un)acceptable luxuries, the role and use of inheritances, attitudes to one’s employer (and in relation to one’s family), changing fashions (fabrics, items, styles), debts and the repayment thereof, dowries, marital economics (especially marrying for wealth), and commodity exchange. The term prodigality dates from at least the fourteenth century, designating excessive spending that is likely to lead to poverty (“prodigal, adj., n., and adv”, OED). The definitions of prodigality offered by late sixteenth and early seventeenth century lexicons emphasise waste and financial excess: the prodigal is “He that hath wasted goodes” (Cooper sig. Ii2 r), the Latin ‘prodigus’ is defined first as ‘prodigal’ and elaborated as designating a “wastefull” and “riotous” “outragious spender” (Thomas sig. Aaa6r), one who is “vnthriftie, lauish, wastfull, riotous, excessiue, or outragious in expence” (Cotgrave sig. Sss vi r), one who shows “wastefulness, riot, unthriftiness” (Blount sig. Ii4 v), who is “too riotous in spending” (Cawdrey sig. G8v). There is no mention in these lexicons of the arc of stray and return that is usually attributed to prodigality. This is supported by the term’s usage in contemporary texts: “The tongue of a prodigall man is bragging of his riotous excesse, and of his ouermuch lauishnesse and spending” (Martyn 97), “how do men commit iniustice by ouer-slauish and prodigall mis-spending of their owne goods?” (Allen 214), “so prodigal in superfluous expences” (Barne sig. C1r), “Needy niggardy causeth many to profes such a needeles necessity, that that is kept from the poore, that profuse prodigality wilfully doth waste” (Bedel C1v), “A spend-thrift sworne to prodigalitie” (Bodenham 212). In addition to the familiar stresses on excess and waste, these texts frequently censure the social ills that prodigality is seen to feed. Most commonly these attacks are levelled against gambling, accumulating debt, and spending on luxuries, alcohol, and smoking, though prodigal expense could be applied to any economic transaction the writer wished to condemn. Such activities are less characteristic of Hal than Falstaff, who is guilty of endless prodigal extravagance: he accumulates debt, he spends on sack and sugar rather than bread, he promises gifts to the sex worker Doll Tearsheet, he thieves, he swindles the crown out of money, and he spends excessively on carnal pleasures. Hal lacks such transgressive excess, and the absence of prodigal excess in the straying son is highly atypical of early modern prodigal son drama. In order to understand the Henry IVs’ treatment of prodigality, as well as early modern prodigality more generally, it is necessary to address its classical context. During and after the Reformation, Aristotle enjoyed a resurgence in popularity and his Nicomachean Ethics emerged as the leading text on the structure and effects of prodigality. This text crucially defines prodigality as excess, as trespass beyond moderation into the extreme. The deficient quality of financial behaviour, what Aristotle calls ἀνελευθερία, is variably rendered as meanness, niggardliness, avarice, illiberality, miserliness, or tenacity. Aristotle is often cited in early modern treatments of prodigality, but the theories were so widely disseminated that it can be difficult to ascertain if a writer is drawing directly from Aristotle or merely his presence in the cultural atmosphere. Concerning Shakespeare, the prevailing critical consensus is that he must have either personally read or been extremely familiar with the Nicomachean Ethics, as has been argued by many critics including Isabella Wheater, Carson Holloway, Lisa Marciano, and Unhae Langis. David
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